Thursday, January 30, 2014

Samsara is a Buddhist word that refers to the cycle of birth, life, death, and reincarnation. It carries with it a connotation of being attached to this physical plane, with all of its associated possibilities of pain and joy, love and suffering... of being unenlightened. Samsara is the opposite of nirvana which is true freedom from pain, suffering, and the individual experience of the outer world. And Fricke and Magidson chose themes, images, and sequences for this film that dramatically support this difference.

This film, like "Baraka," is hard to describe. It is more--or perhaps less?--than a documentary. Just like "Baraka," it is a meditation, a wordless experience that presents and suggests very large, even overwhelming ideas that are core to the human condition. It is like a dream, presenting images without words or explanation... and because of this form, the images resonate on a deeper level than if such ideas were to be written about or spoken of.

Filmed over nearly five years (the filmmakers started in 2006, after "Baraka") in twenty-five countries on five continents, and shot on glorious seventy-millimetre film, "Samsara" shows sacred grounds, disaster zones, industrial complexes, and natural wonders. It shows scenes of love and tenderness, scenes of technological and societal alienation, scenes of creation and destruction, scenes of lush forests and desolate deserts, and scenes of great beauty juxtaposed against the violence, hopelessness, and death inherent in the human experience.

And like "Baraka," we see some familiar sights. We return to Mecca, we return to many temples in Asia... but I am not complaining. While the concept and execution might not be revolutionary, what the filmmakers do is truly transcendent. The camera work is of course stunning. The way scenes are framed and tracked is gorgeous: one could remove any frame from this film and the result would be an exquisite work of art. And returning from "Baraka" are composer Michael Stearns and renowned singer and composer Lisa Gerrard (Dead Can Dance) who created the musical score. For "Samsara," the musical process was a little different. The film was edited in silence and given to Stearns, Gerrard, and composer Marcello De Francisci who composed the music in direct response to the visuals.

The result is a sense of mono no aware (see previous post here), the knowledge that what one is seeing is impermanent, transcendent, part of a world which will one day be destroyed. In this film, we are witness to all the good and bad that is possible, the beauty and torture, all the tender things, love, and lives that are lived and lost.

Recommend? Absolutely. This is about as perfect as any film can get. Like I mentioned earlier, this is a wordless meditation and requires an open mind and heart to fully appreciate the experience. If you need a film to be "about" something, perhaps this is not for you. But if you can immerse yourself in a stream of consciousness triggered by the world itself, you're in for a treat.

"And here is [twelfth-century Buddhist monk Yoshida] Kenkō on the link between impermanence and beauty: 'If man were never to fade away like the dews of Adashino, never to vanish like the smoke over Toribeyama, how things would lose their power to move us! The most precious thing in life is its uncertainty' (Keene, 7). The acceptance and celebration of impermanence goes beyond all morbidity, and enables full enjoyment of life.

Insofar as we don't rejoice in life we fail to appreciate the pathos of the things with which we share our lives. For most of us, some of these things, impermanent as they are, will outlast us—and especially if they have been loved they will become sad things: 'It is sad to think that a man's familiar possessions, indifferent to his death, should remain long after he is gone' (Keene, 30)."

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

All animals fall into one of 14 categories:*Those who belong to the emperor*Embalmed ones*Those who are trained*Suckling pigs*Mermaids (or Sirens)*Fabulous ones*Stray dogs*Those who are included in this classification*Those who tremble as if they were mad*Innumerable ones*Those drawn with a very fine camel hair brush*Others*Those who have just broken the flower vase*Those who, at a distance, resemble flies

--from "Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge," a fictitious taxonomy of animals described in the book THE ANALYTICAL LANGUAGE OF JOHN WILKINS by the magic realist writer Jorge Luis Borges

Tuesday, January 28, 2014

Vanessa Leissring's startlingly pristine photographs of gas stations (or petrol stations for those not in the US) are beautiful and so atmospheric--lonely, mysterious, isolated. Oases floating in the inky black of night...

Leissring's photos bring to my mind "The Last Chance Texaco," the glorious song from Rickie Lee Jones' debut album released in 1979. It is a lonely, pensive but yearning song, just like the photos above. I have always loved the chilling moment at the end of the song where she mimics passing, speeding trucks on the highway. Goosebumps...

A long stretch of headlightsBends into I-9Tiptoe into truck stopsAnd sleepy diesel eyesVolcanoes rumble in the taxiAnd glow in the darkCamels in the driver's seatA slow, easy markBut you ran out of gasDown the road a pieceThen the battery went deadAnd now the cable won't reach...It's your last chanceTo check under the hoodLast chanceShe ain't soundin' too good,Your last chanceTo trust the man with the starYou've found the last chance TexacoWell, he tried to be StandardHe tries to be MobilHe tried living in a WorldAnd in a ShellThere was this block-busted blondeHe loved her, free parts and laborBut she broke down and diedShe threw all the rods he gave herBut this one ain't fuel-injectedHer plug's disconnectedShe gets scared and she stallsShe just needs a man, that's allIt's her last chanceHer timing's all wrongHer last chanceShe can't idle this longHer last chanceTurn her over and goPullin' out of the last chance Texaco

Monday, January 27, 2014

Swedish artist Simon Stalenhag has worked on video games as concept and art director and it shows in his personal work. He shows us, in his hyper-realistic oil paintings, images of everyday life on Earth invaded by seemingly alien technology. It feels as if there is a kind of tacit but possibly fragile truce between humanity and these extraterrestrial machines... or whatever is operating them.

Saturday, January 25, 2014

I have a weak spot for painters who capture images of my beloved San Francisco, the most European city in the United States. Hsin-Yao Tsing's loose, Impressionistic canvases show views of The City that are supremely familiar to me. I have been seeing these views through fog, rain, and sun for over 30 years, and these gorgeous, lyrical paintings do The City justice.

I really love these next three images of basically the same view: Alcatraz in the Bay. It captures the romance and light of San Francisco perfectly... just lovely...

Friday, January 24, 2014

“Perhaps the whole root of our trouble, the human trouble, is that we will sacrifice all the beauty of our lives, will imprison ourselves in totems, taboos, crosses, blood sacrifices, steeples, mosques, races, armies, flags, nations, in order to deny the fact of death, the only fact we have. It seems to me that one ought to rejoice in the fact of death--ought to decide, indeed, to earn one's death by confronting with passion the conundrum of life.”
--James Baldwin

Thursday, January 23, 2014

In sympathy for the half of the United States that is currently suffering under frigid temperatures and snow drifts, here is the art work of Mark Thompson who paints eerily empty rural scenes under snow.

By contrast, he also paints frosted European cityscapes, but just as oddly and disturbingly empty...
Where have all the people gone? It's a New Ice Age.

Top to bottom: Be Lost In Me; Clothe Yourself For The Wind; Revealed Wounds; The Injuries Of Time; To Suffer The Weight; From Nothing To Everything; The Tears Of Things; To Remain Unheard; To Unpick Time's Hold; What Remains

About Me

About "Oh, By The Way"

"Oh, By The Way" is my digital scrap book of things I like, things I would share with a close friend and say: “Oh, by the way, do you know of this artist/ clothing or interior designer/ model/ singer/ actor/ gorgeous man… or, have you seen this video/ photo/ film... or heard (or do you remember) this song/ band... or, read this book/ poem/ inspiring quote... or, visited this place/ restaurant/ famous building... or, have you heard of this amazing new scientific discovery?”

I am dedicated to posting the positive, the fascinating, the beautiful, the interesting, the moving, and the inspiring and uplifting. Sometimes I post cultural as well as personal observations, milestones, and remembrances. And just like life, all of these things may often have a bit of melancholy or even sadness in them, which is what makes our time here so lovely and bittersweet and precious.

Some of the photos, art, poetry, and prose are my own original work, credited with my initials, JEF. When it isn't, I always try to post links to the original source material, but often I find photos on the web that are not linked or other material that is not sourced. In these instances, I post them without malice since it is assumed that such things, by being globally posted on something as uncontrollable as the internet to begin with, are in the public domain. If you identify the source of an image that is not linked, please politely let me know (without accusing me of theft) and I will be happy to provide a link.

I hope to inspire and entertain my readers with things that inspire and entertain ME. There is a startling amount of beauty and creativity in the world and it enriches us all to participate in it.

All-time Favorite Films

2001: A Space Odyssey (Kubrick)

After Hours (Hysterical, hair-raising ride through NYC at night)

Amelie

American Beauty (Alan Ball)

Baraka (Stunning, transcending—the "spiritus mundi" on film)

Belle et Bete (Cocteau)

Big Sleep, The (The epitome of film noir)

Bringing Up Baby (Hepburn & Grant—the epitome of screwball comedy)

Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover, The (Greenaway)

Crash (Cronenberg—DIFFICULT subject, not for everyone)

Don’t Look Now (Nicolas Roeg—ultimate modern gothic horror)

Drowning By Numbers (Greenaway)

Easy Rider

Edward II (Derek Jarman)

Erendira (From magic realist Marquez’ brilliant short story)

Eyes Wide Shut (Kubrick's last film)

Fearless (Jeff Bridges—life and death)

Funny Bones (Leslie Caron, Jerry Lewis, and the brilliant Lee Evans)

Holiday (Hepburn & Grant)

Howard’s End (The ultimate statement of the unfairness of class systems)